Where the Communist Party Was Founded: South Lake and the Nanhu Red Boat
You arrive at South Lake expecting a historical monument, but what you find is something quieter and more unsettling—a landscape where modern China's origin story sits afloat on calm water. On a July night in 1921, delegates to the First National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, having fled police surveillance in Shanghai, reconvened aboard a traditional wooden canal boat moored on this lake. That meeting, held in secret aboard what became known as the Nanhu Red Boat, is where the party was officially founded. Today, a replica of that boat sits permanently at the Pavilion of Mist and Rain, a mid-lake island accessible only by ferry, and drawing the kind of pilgrimage tourism that comes with visiting a birthplace—though visitors are kept at a careful distance and forbidden to board during times of political sensitivity.
- Take the ferry to the Pavilion of Mist and Rain (Yanyu Lou) on the mid-lake island. The pavilion itself, rebuilt in 1918 but furnished in 19th-century style, anchors a pleasure garden that once attracted emperors. The Communist boat replica requires an extra fee and comes with its own security logic.
- Visit Xiaoyingzhou Island, the smaller island connected to the northeast shore by bridge. It holds a pavilion once dedicated to Cang Jie, the mythical inventor of Chinese characters, and was historically a gathering place for scholar-officials. A covered bridge nearby marks where the lake connects to the Grand Canal.
- Walk the free shoreline. Most of South Lake's perimeter is accessible on foot, and the best way to understand the landscape is to circle it by taxi or bus, observing how the lake fits into the city's modern fabric.
Stone Gates and Restored Streets: The Old Walled City
The Citadel of Jiaxing (Zicheng) has been reduced to fragments—a rebuilt front gate on Fuqian Street and sections of wall—but what remains speaks to a continuity that most southeastern Chinese cities have lost. Built in 231 AD as the administrative heart of Jiaxing, it survived until 1912, then was dismantled in the 20th century. In June 2021, the city opened the renovated Zicheng Site Park, threading a "millennium-spanning avenue" through what remains, using copper ribbons, ginkgo trees, and carefully placed lighting to let you walk through the city's layered history.
- See the front gate on Fuqian Street. It's imposing not because it dominates but because it refuses to disappear.
- Explore Meiwan Street (Plum Blossom Bay Street) on the southwestern edge of the old city, where restored historic buildings house small museums, restaurants, and bars. This is where Kim Koo, the Korean independence leader, took refuge during the Second World War. Several other significant residences line the street—including the former home of Zhu Shenghao, who translated Shakespeare into Chinese—and Qingfen Hall, a family memorial of the prominent Qian clan, is open to the public. Winding brooks, willows, and small lakeside parks give the street a lived-in character rather than a theme-park one.
- Walk Yuehe Street (Moon River Street) along Zhongji Road on the northern side of the old city. This neighbourhood retains the feel of working commerce—tea rooms, small restaurants, cake and bread sellers, and workshop buildings—and gives a more authentic sense of everyday canal-town life than its more refined neighbour across the city.
Two Great Churches: French Stone and Monastic Order
Jiaxing holds two remarkable Catholic structures, each telling a different story of faith and rupture in 20th-century China. St Mary's Church, built by the Carmelites between 1917 and 1930 with materials imported from France, was once the tallest building in the city. Red Guards destroyed its roof and shattered its windows during the Cultural Revolution; the church now sits as a ruin in a cleared neighbourhood, its imposing shell awaiting promised restoration. Vincent Abbey, a Lazarite monastery that was one of China's largest Catholic institutions, remains remarkably intact—its cloisters visible from the street, though the building is closed to the public and the city has plans for its future as a museum.
- Visit St Mary's Church at 55 Ziyang Street, near the centre of the old city, just west of the Citadel. The exterior was renovated and lit in July 2021, and a public lawn now surrounds it—a good place to sit and consider the building's scarred history.
- See Vincent Abbey from the street at 153 Guangming Street, northeast of the old city near Yuehe Street. Though you cannot enter, the cloisters and architecture are visible, and the abbey's scale suggests what the monastic presence once meant to Jiaxing's religious landscape.
Canal Towns Within the City: Wuzhen and Xitang
Two of Jiaxing's townships—Wuzhen and Xitang—have preserved and restored the kind of water-based settlement that defines the region: houses built along small canals, boats as transport, narrow stone bridges, and the particular quiet of places where water and architecture evolved together. Both are popular with tourists and film crews, which means they are neither undiscovered nor entirely lost to commerce, but they remain genuinely evocative of what canal-town life looked like before modernization.
- Explore the canal-side architecture, stone bridges, and boat routes. These townships offer the canal-town experience without requiring a day trip outside the city proper.
When to Go and What to Eat
Jiaxing's climate follows the Yangtze River valley pattern—humid summers, cool winters. Spring and autumn are the most comfortable seasons for walking the old city and visiting the lake. The city is famous for zongzi, leaf-wrapped glutinous rice parcels, and has established a "Zongzi Cultural Ecological Preservation Area" in its southern suburbs, protecting the cultivation of specific rice varieties, bamboo leaf harvesting, and traditional wrapping techniques. At the Museum of Zongzi Culture on Yuehe Street, you can learn the history of this staple food. Yuehe Street itself is lined with tea rooms and sellers of traditional Chinese cakes and baked goods, making it the neighbourhood to wander for authentic local eating.
Jiaxing sits on the Grand Canal between Beijing and Hangzhou, and on modern rail lines connecting to Shanghai and beyond. The city is beginning to unearth itself as a tourism destination—restoring churches, rebuilding citadels, and opening neighbourhoods that had been left to decay. Start by booking a boat tour of South Lake, then spend a full day walking the old walled city's restored streets. If you have time, make a separate trip to Wuzhen or Xitang to see what Jiaxing's canal-town heritage looks like when water and architecture still determine the rhythm of daily life.